The 5 best historic finds in Red Dead Redemption 2

Set in 1899, Red Dead Redemption 2 has become one of the year’s best selling games. It’s a sweeping western, taking place at the turn of the century, just as the old west is starting to fall and a new world rises. And believe me when I say this game is packed with incredible historical story arcs, themes and (of course!) Easter eggs

Now before we get to looking at the best hidden and not so hidden history gems in RDR2, let’s get this out the way – In no way am I saying RDR2 is historically accurate all the time. It’s not. Like at all. It’s a game; it’s entertainment, not a documentary.

Think of RDR2 as a really long (like 60 hours long) western film. It can’t be accurate all the time because it would massively impact the pace, plot and entertainment.

But that doesn’t mean that the history it does contain isn’t incredible!

Historic events are intertwined with several of the games main quests. Then there’s the Easter eggs and nods to the macabre side of US history. And all that’s not even mentioning the stunning turn of the century backdrop!

Basically, if like me, you’re both a gamer and a history nerd, it’s Christmas.

SPOILERS AHEAD!

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  Enough preamble-let’s go!

1.The real life murderers!

During the course of RDR2 you might come across two sets of really messed up serial killers, both of whom are based on real life murderers of the old west (yes this stuff actually happened! Sleep tight.)

First up we have the ‘Aberdeens’ and their pig farm. Upon coming across the farm you’ll be invited in by Bray Aberdeen to have dinner with him and his wife, Tammy.

It quickly transpires that Tammy and Bray are in fact super close siblings. And if you stay for their offer of dinner and drinks, you’ll wake up in a blood soaked mass grave, having had all your money and valuables stolen.

And this all happened in real life! In the 1870s The Kansas based Bender family opened up a general store come inn, The Wayside Inn, right by the Osage Trial. Run by the John Sr and his wife, Elvaria, as well as grown up children, John and Kate (who claimed to be brother and sister, but also, separately, claimed to be married)

The Benders took the Osage trails tired travellers into their inn. They’d offer them a warm bed for the night, feed them and thenbeat them to death with a hammer (slitting their throat for good measure) before robbing and throwing the corpse into a mass grave. Sound familiar?

Meet the Benders, history’s most fucked up family

The Bender family soon realised that people were starting to suspect something was up with them. So they fled.

By the time the authorities arrived at the Benders inn, it was completely empty. Inside was a foul smell, the source of which turned out to be the mass grave that was hidden underneath the floorboards.

Around a dozen victims were found, but it’s suspected the Benders killed many more. Though, as the family successfully disappeared without a trace, we’ll never know what other bloody secrets they were hiding. (Shout out to historian, Mike Stauchberry, who was the first person to spot the Bender Aberdeen link!)

RDR2s second serial killer is the fully deranged, Edmund Lowry Jr, who you meet as part of the American Dreams side-quest.

Throughout the game you stumble across several male corpses, all brutally murdered (with by the looks of it, an axe) their body parts strewn around the landscape. Clues are left to track the killer; which is how you’ll find Edmund Lowry Jr and his kill bunker.

The bunker is littered with hacked apart bodies. And, by the differing size of bodies, as well as the several posters for missing children, we can tell that Edmund really isn’t picky about who he murders.

Edmund himself is a gentleman, well spoken and dressed, but with a deranged look in his eye.

Now, Edmund Lowry Jr is some Inception level Easter eggery. His character name is a nod to serial killer, Eddie Low, from Rockstar games other series, GTA. AND, he is also based on real life serial killer, Stephen Richards

Stephen Richards and Edmund Lowry Jr

Richards was Nebraska’s first serial killer (earning him the nickname, The Nebraska Fiend). Much like his RDR2 counterpart he murdered wherever he went. Shooting 4 men between 1876 and 1877 in both Nebraska and Iowa. With most of the victims killed either because they bored Richards, or they’d had a minor falling out.

Then in 1978, Richards proved himself to be totally indiscriminate in killing, when he murdered the Harleson family.

He crept in their house in the dead of night. Taking an axe and murdering a lone mother, her young daughters and baby.

For some reason, after butchering an entire family, Richards decided to stay in Kearney, the town where he had just committed one of the eras most brutal crimes. But Richards being Richards, he couldn’t just lay low and within months had to flee Kearney after beating his neighbour to death with a hammer.

Running from the law initially went well for Richards. Despite the fact that behind his calm smile he was clearly unhinged, he just didn’t look the part of a murderer. In fact the only reason he was caught was that police had time to catch up with, after Richards took the night off being on the run to go to a ball!

Moral of the story: don’t go to social gatherings

2. The suffrage of it all

Now, there’s been a lot of bad press about the inclusion of the suffrage movement in RDR2.

With the setting of the game 20 years before much of America gained equal voting rights across the genders, the player comes across several suffrage campaigners throughout the course of the game. Both as side characters and characters you go on side missions with.

So of course, the internet being the internet, a few YouTubers decided to use RDR2’s open world mechanics to film themselves brutally murdering suffrage campaigners. The media immediately fell on this and decried RDR2 for encouraging players to kill women’s rights campaigners.

But that’s just not true, because:

RDR2 is really good at exploring & explaining suffrage!

The game slowly introduces the concept of suffrage. It works as a sort of playable history lesson. Introducing individual suffrage campaigners before immersing the player into a local suffrage group.

Early on we see a woman campaigning on the street. And, my god, the details around her peaceful protest are just fantastic.

In fact I’d be surprised if her paper set up and stance weren’t partly inspired by the below picture of English suffragette, Sophia Dulep Singh.

At one point, the player actually helps facilitate a suffrage rally. Driving a wagon of campaigners through streets of people jeering at the women.

The whole time, the leader of the suffrage branch explains the movement and what they’re campaigning for. It’s a fantastic way of introducing people to a chapter of history that everyone knows happened, but many don’t actually know much about.

3.The landscape inspired by a 19th century art movement

RDR2 arguably has one of the most stunning explore-able landscapes in any game. And that takes your breath away, luminous rural art is all inspired by 19th century art movement, The Hudson River School. 

That’s right all this high tech beauty is straight 19th century art

Started in the early 19th century by a group of landscape painters led by Thomas Cole, the Hudson River School created dramatic and somewhat enhanced depictions of America’s great sweeping lands.

But it’s this movements second generation that clearly had the biggest impact on RDR2.

From around 1850 until the mid to late 1870s, artists like Frederic Edwin Church and Albert Beirdsadt pushed the movement out West. Going to extreme lengths to get inspiration, they’d join Westward Expeditions. Putting themselves at the forefront of America’s quickly changing landscapes.

These artists also bought the new style of ‘luminisim’ to the Hudson River School. Experimenting with how light effected an environment and creating hyperreal worlds of hazy skies and glowing streams of light.

These paintings took America by storm. Often standing at 6ft (or taller!) people would pay to come and look up at this new world that was being created around them.

Albert Beirdsadt , The Sierra Nevada, 1868

In Oct 2018, RDR2s studio, Rockstar ,welcomed the comparisons with Hudson River School and it’s citation as a source for inspiration. However, in a December email exchange with Polygon, the studio denied having used any art as a source of inspiration.

Now I’m really polite, so I’m hesitant to call straight up bullshit on Rockstar’s statement from December…. instead let’s use this as an amazing example of how such iconic art movements ingratiate themselves into our societal psyche.

Even though the movement was created more than 150 years ago, The Hudson River School lingers. It helped shape how America saw itself and that impact lasts for centuries. All the way from the canvas to the computer screen.

William Louis Sonntag, Golden Sunlight

4.The Pinkerton Detectives

Throughout RDR2, pretty much every major character either has a run in or a bitch session about ‘The blasted Pinkertons’ (these guys are criminals after all!)

And oh my, have these guys found fame online. With countless threads excitedly chatting about how the Pinkertons were actually real (and not a yarn created for westerns)

The Pinkertons were the FBI before there was an FBI. Founded in 1850 by Allan Pinkerton, the agency were essentially super cops for hire. Contracted out by everyone from the government and private business groups.

Allan Pinkerton, detective agency founder and owner of exceptional facial hair

In 1861 the agency successfully uncovered a plot to kill Abraham Lincoln, eventually foiling the murder (though Lincoln would still be assassinated 4 years later)

Forerunners in crime, the Pinkertons hired one of the world’s first female detectives and created arguably the first modern crime data system.

By the 1890s the agency had grown so much that there were more Pinkertons than there were standing US army (so Arthur wasn’t lying, you really couldn’t get away from them!)

But just like in RDR2, these ‘good guys’ weren’t always nice. Take for example the time when the Pinkertons threw flares into Jesse James family farm, in an attempt to flush the outlaw from his hiding place. Except Jesse James wasn’t there. And one of the flares exploded, killing James kid brother and leaving his mother armless.

Fun fact: this logo supposedly helped popularise the term ‘private eye’

5. You get tuberculosis!

Ok, this might seem like a wierd one to end on, but for a game jam packed with guns, knives, shoot outs and the odd blood thirsty bear, it’s fair to say that it’s surprising when the big nasty turns out to be tuberculosis.

But… is it surprising? After all, Red Dead 2 is set in 1899, when tuberculous was a massive killer! You were way more likely to die from tuberculosis than bounty hunters or rival gangs.

The US census shows us that in 1899, TB was the biggest killer in America (gun shot wounds coming in last on the list of causes of death). And TB wasn’t just ravaging America. It was an epidemic that was attacking both Europe and the US so much, it became known as the white plague.

Tuberculosis related deaths were now so common that they were just a fact of life. The illness even became romanticised! Poet, Lord Byron, actually once commenting that he would ‘like to die of consumption.’

So of course, if anything was going to put the games protagonist, Arthur, in real mortal peril, it’s TB. And what makes this even better (historically speaking at least) is that when Arthur, is diagnosed with tuberculosis, there is no cure.

Because it’s 1899 and if you have tuberculosis, you’re pretty fucked.

Though in 1882, Robert Koch successfully demonstrated the exact causes of TB, medical science just wasn’t ready to use this information to provide a cure. In fact it would be anouther 50 years until a widespread TB medicine would be available.

So, when Arthur gets diagnosed with TB, it’s a real death scentence.

And the fact that RD2 sticks to its historic guns on this one is amazing and rare!

To give you an idea of how rare this is in gaming – swathes of Red Dead players are still hitting up the internet looking for a cure to save Arthur.

Spoiler: there isn’t one. Sorry lads.

Sorry Arthur!

And that’s the list, for now! I couldn’t fit in so much and I know that 2nd time around, I’m going to find even more. So let me know what you think I’ve missed and what should make the list next time.

5 of the baddest bitches to ever live…that you never heard of

History is full of ladies that never get the due they deserve. These ladies very much fit that bill! From freedom fighting piracy to leading samurai armies and even straight up Game of Thrones-esque batshittery, it’s time we celebrated the mark left by these baddest bitches from history:

1. The tank wielding badass: Mariya Vasilyena Oktyabrskaya

When Mariya’s husband was killed fighting in WW2, she did what any grieving widow would…

Sold everything she owned, bought a tank, named it ‘fighting girlfriend’ and set off to kill as many Nazis as humanly possible.

Standard.

Slightly terrifying…but go get it Mariya

Mariya grew up dirt poor in Crimea at the start of the 20th century. One of 10 children, there was rarely enough food to go around.

Yet Mariya didn’t let this destroy her, instead channeling her hardship into a love of politics and the military.

The fiesty young girl grew up to be a kickass young woman, who didn’t give a shit about gender rules; learning how to drive and shoot.

She married Ilya Oktyabrskaya, an army officer and the love of her life. Though the couple couldn’t have kids, they had each other and that was all Mariya wanted.

Still, when Ilya was called to fight for The Soviet Union in WW2, Mariya happily bid him farewell. After all Russia was being invaded by Germany and needed brave soldiers like Ilya.

And then Mariya got the call that is everyone’s worst nightmare.

Her beloved Ilya was dead. 

Seriously, can nobody let true love live?!?

Following Ilyas death, Mariya wrote to Stalin:

 

My husband was killed in action defending the motherland. I want revenge on the fascist dogs for his death and for the death of Soviet people tortured by the fascist barbarians. For this purpose, I’ve deposited all my personal savings – 50,000 rubles – to the National Bank in order to build a tank. I kindly ask to name the tank ‘Fighting Girlfriend’ and to send me to the frontline as a driver of said tank.

Stalin, agreed…because, well you would wouldn’t you?!?

I mean look at that steely stare!!

Mariya was made to go through several months of tank training (way more than her male comrades)

It soon became clear that Mariya could drive, shoot and lob grenades like no other. So she was sent to the front line.

Mariya preps Fighting Girlfriend for combat.

Her first mission in Fighting Girlfriend was to help block German troops route to Moscow.

She nimbly manovered Fighting Girlfriend around the battlefield, destroying several anti tank guns, machine gun nest and enemy soldiers.

Then she was hit!

With Fighting Girlfriend out of action, Mariya was ordered to remain where she was and wait for help…

Obviously she didn’t.

Instead she calmly got out her tank in the middle of a war zone; fixed it, leapt back in and entered the fray once more.

Yes..this is literal insanity, for the love of christ never try a move this ballsy at home!

Now promoted to Sergeant, Mariya and Fighting Girlfriend continued their steady stream of casual bad assery.

Then in 1944 Fighting Girlfriend was again hit.

As usual, Mariya refused to let this stop her doing her job. She leapt out and starting working on Fighting Girlfriend.

Just then another shell hit.

Even Mariya didn’t stand a chance against a blast like this.

She was taken off the battlefield in a coma, from which she never woke.

*sob* Mariya and Fighting Girlfriend forever!!!

But Mariya and Fighting Girlfriend lived on. She was honoured with the Soviet Unions highest military honour. To this day she is still remembered in Russia for her bravery and badassey.

 

2. The Samurai Sex Symbol: Tomoe Gozen

Forget everything you think you know about samurais. Because we’re about to blow the doors off these stoic blokes with swords.

You guys…there were female samurais, and they were a level of badass never before seen! (Thanks by the way to @elaanfaun on Twitter, who suggested we check this out!)

Prepare to get your mind blown with female badassery

From the medieval period onwards, girls from samurai families could be trained up as onna-bugeisha, which roughly translates as:

Warrior Women

They trained in fighting (of course), as well as in maths and science.

These were insanely intelligent ladies who could both lead military strategising and single handedly take down a group of men in hand to hand combat.

One of the most badass of these ladies was Tomoe Gozen.

Known for being both beautiful and ballsy, Tomoe was a 12 century warrior not to be messed with. Tomoe had an unparalleled collection of war trophies…which in the 12th century came in the form of the decapitated heads of enemies who had died at your hands.

Tomoe’s pad was full of dead guy heads (which must have been a treat for overnight guests!)

And she wasn’t just killing it at interior design!

See, Tomoe was around during Japan’s, Genpei War (a monumental civil war) and her fighting chops were so good that she was made into a leading commander for one of the armies by its leader, Lord Kiso no Yoshinaka!

Oh me? Just casually leading a 12 century army, you know, the usual

In 1183, Tomoe led over 1000 men into battle!

Of course she led from the front and of course they won.

Such fears of badassery weren’t unusual for Tomoe.

She regularly led huge forces of men into war; once even leading a force of just 300 samurais into battle against 6000! Emerging as one of only 5 survivors!

Did I not say you shouldn’t mess with her!?

Tomoe’s final battle was a doozy!

With her side emerging the clear victors of the war, it was time to decide who would get to actually lead Japan when all was said and done.

It was a toss up between Tomoe’s boss, Lord Kiso and his cousin Minamoto no Yoritomo.

Of course voting for a leader would be way too logical…so they had their strongest warriors duke it out instead.

Sure, it makes no political sense, but way more fun to watch than another Trump clusterfuck

Though Tomoe was one fierce fighter, the rest of Lord Kiso’s forces were no match for Minamoto no Yoritomo.

Soon only Tomoe and 5 others were left alive.

Lord Kiso called for his warriors to retreat…but Tomoe wanted to have the last word.

So, she charged into a group of 30 of the enemies best fighters and emerged a few minutes later with the head of the strongest.

Let’s assume it had pride of place in Tomoe’s decapitated head tablescape.

 

3. Jeanne de Clisson – The Lioness Of Brittany

The definition of a woman scorned, Jeanne went from an average medieval noblewoman to one on the warpath.

She dealt with her enemies brutally and soon become Frances most feared force….seriously guys this is some Game of Thrones shit right here!

Remember that time Cersei killed legit everyone? That…but 100& more.

Jeanne had already been married twice before she married Oliver de Clisson in 1330.

But this marriage wasn’t like the others. See, Jeanne and Oliver actually loved each; a rarity in this era!

The couple had several children and lived in relative bliss, until Oliver was called up to war…and everything went fully tits up. 

Oh Dani, you have no idea how bad this is about to go

The French and the English, were at war over the dukedom of Brittany. Oliver chose to fight for France; under the leadership of Charles de Blois.

Things were going great…until Oliver was taken prisoner by the English…and Charles de Blois suspected Oliver of losing to the English on purpose.

And so, when England and France eventually called a truce, France decided to celebrate by executing Oliver. 

Oh..is this not how you celebrate getting on with people?

Jeanne was (understandably) devastated by her husbands celebratory beheading

But Jeanne didn’t want to go off and play the repentant widow. She wanted revenge on everyone who had allowed Oliver’s death.

So she sold everything to buy war supplies and set off to bring down the French nobility, Charles de Blois and even Frances ruler, King Philip.

Basically

Her first stop was the home of one of Charles de Blois’s pals.

She arrived outside his castle with her children…and a small army of men.

Still – what could a woman do? And so, the gates were opened.

By morning almost everybody in the castle had been massacred. Its contents stolen and only a few wide eyed survivors left to tell of the what they’d witnessed.

Jeanne de Clisson: she may look sweet but she will straight up kill you

Jeanne fled across the channel with her children, in hopes of using England to fund her revenge spree.

She got her wish; buying three war ships, which Jeanne painted black and hung red sails on.

Then, with a band of pirates, outlaws and supporters, she set out for the channel; attacking any ship with a French flag.

The worst time in history to be travelling whilst wearing a beret

For 13 years, Jeanne waged war on France via the sea.

It was said that if a French noble was onboard a ship then Jeanne would get an axe and behead them herself; just as she believed, they had allowed her husband to be.

Only a few survivors remained from each ship. Allowed to live so they could return to France and tell of the horrors they’d witnessed

Then just as suddenly she had started her quest for revenge…Jeanne stopped.

She moved to England, where she was gifted lands and wads if cash for so kindly cleaning the channel of the French enemy.

Then she remarried and (weirdly) returned to France…where she peacefully lived out the rest of her days.

 

4. The rebel pioneer: Sophie Morigeau

With one eye, bright green glasses and a ‘not taking any of you’re bullshit’ attitude, Sophie Morigeau took the pioneer world by storm and redefined what it meant to be a woman.

She refused to set up home and let some guy go have her adventures. Instead she broke all the rules and set out to rule her male dominated world.

Ok, get prepared to start shouting ‘Yes Sophie!’ a whole lot.

Growing up on the Canadian frontier, Sophie was brave, bulshy and able to give as good as she got; she was basically built for having ridiculous pioneer adventures.

 

Sadly, that’s not what nice girls like Sophie did.

Her parents tried everything they could to ‘civilise’ her. Sending off for a good catholic education and teaching her homemaking skills.

At 16 she was married off to guy almost a decade older. He was nice enough, but married life just wasn’t Sophie’s bag.

So she ditched the husband, took back her maiden name and set up a gold mining trade businesses. 

As you do. 

All together now: YES SOPHIE!!!

 

 

 

Ditching a husband and running a business solo were unheard of female pursuits in this age. Still, Sophie wasn’t done…she wanted more.

She wanted to grow her business. And the best way to do that was to do what every other entrepreneur with any business sense did at the time; find some good land and claim it.

Except women couldn’t do that.

…but Sophie did anyway.

On this plot of land she almost single handedly built herself a home and a trading post.

Just casually building a home… solo… from scratch… in an era with no power tools or flatpack – Can I get a: Yes Sophie!!!

With her business thriving, Sophie started opening herself up to male company – obviously no strings attached, after all she wasn’t giving everything up to be a wife again!

 

The community described Sophie’s boyfriends as ‘husbands’…just husbands who obeyed everything Sophie said and got their marching orders when she got bored/tired of them.

There were of course ‘husbands’ who weren’t happy with Sophie having so much independence…

One ‘husband’ who emotionally abused Sophie, mysteriously turned up drowned.

And ‘husband’ no 12 somehow ended up shot after failing to make way for ‘husband’ no 13.

Ok, badass frontier and all BUT might skip this ‘yes Sophie’…potential spousal murder isn’t really it

Luckily though, Sophie didn’t need men to have fun. As a good pioneer, she had plenty of adventures!

 

On one adventure she lost an eye when hit by a tree branch; thus creating the need for her signature bright green specs.

She also famously got into a dramatic horse and buggy crash, after which she was left lying in the road with one rib sticking out of her stomach.

What did Sophie do? Amputate the rib herself of course!

Then she hung the rib bone in her home, a pink ribbon tied neatly round it (If only Sophie and Tomoe Gozen had lived at the same time! Together they could have owned the most niche interior design business)

Despite her self surgery shenanigans, Sophie lived to a ripe old age, continuing to build her business and live life to the fullest until she was well into her twilight years.

Yes Sophie!

5. The Pirate Queen: Grace O’Malley

Known as Ireland’s pirate queen, Grace O’Malley was a women you didn’t mess with. She went from innocent little girl to seafaring warrior Queen, battling for her peoples rights and giving two fingers to Queen Elizabeth I.

Modern interp of Grace

Graces’ Dad was an Irish Chieftain; earning cash from both massively overcharging the boats who used the waters that fell under his control and sailing to and from exotic lands (well…Spain)

Sadly for Grace, Daddy O’Malley wasn’t crazy about his baby girl joining him on his pirate filled sea adventures.

It’s said that when she asked to join him on the high seas, her parents lied and said as she was a girl, her hair was too long to sail.

This didn’t stop Grace.

She grabbed a knife, lopped off her locks and rocked up at her Dads ship the next day ready for Pirating 101!

Not even 4ft and already more badass than me!

Grace turned out to be a natural leader and following her fathers death it was she who took over the family business, not her brothers!

This meant Grace now owned a good chunk of Ireland, had wealth of her own and was a Queen. Nice!

But obviously Grace wasn’t content to stop there.

At 15 she married a famous war hero, who was also heir to the O’Flaherty title and thus due to own an even bigger chunk of Ireland not to mention a ton of cash!

How can you achieve so much before you’re even legally allowed to drink?!?

Grace and her new husband had 3 children together before he was killed by a rival clan in an ambush.

Unsurprisingly, Grace didn’t slink away a devastated widow.

Instead she took control of his ships and got herself a new lover!

Sadly, Graces new lover was also murdered by a rival clan…so Grace stormed their castle and had them all horrifically killed. As you do.

Not a normal reaction..but then again Grace isn’t your average lass

By her early twenties, Grace had a sizeable hunk of Ireland, a shit ton of ships and even more supporters.

 

She married again, this time to a guy called Iron Richard, for political reasons (*cough* he was very very rich *cough*)

Grace gave birth to the couples child onboard one of her ships.

Almost immediately after she had given birth, the ship was attackers.

Grace of course led the charge against these merciless attackers; firing a blunderbuss whilst wrapped up in a blanket.

Again: She defeated an pirate attack immediately after giving birth

Sadly, for all her badass adventures, things weren’t as exciting at home. Graces new husband was all kinds of boring!

 

So a year into their marriage Iron Richard returned home to their castle to find the whole thing locked up.

Grace stuck her head out of the window and shouted down to him:

‘I dismiss you Richard Burke’

Just like that. Marriage over. Graces next big challenge came from England. See Queen Elizabeth I was determined to bring the Irish clans under English rule.

Elizabeth used both bribery and force to take power away from Ireland’s leading Chieftens, Princes and Princesses.

Yet Grace managed to keep building her empire up.

Well, at least until Elizabeths governor in Ireland squeezed out much of Graces income, attacked her home and took two of her sons and her half brother as ransom.

Naturally, Grace didn’t back down and instead set sail for England, to demand Elizabeth give back her family and basically calm the fuck down.

Seriously though Liz, back the fuck off

The pair met at Greenwich Palace where Grace refused to curtesy for Elizabeth. After all…they were both Queens.

 

She also refused to remove her dagger and did a massively snotty sneeze into a noble woman’s fine silk handkerchief…which she duly chucked in the nearest fire; shrugging off the courtiers outrage.

With the nicities over, Grace talked finalities with Elizabeth in fluent Latin.

It was decided that Elizabeth’s governor would be removed from Ireland and Graces family freed. In return, Grace had to promise not to join any Irish rebellions.

Grace agreed and set off back to Ireland…where she joined the Irish revolts and went on to live to a ripe old age.

This was interesting! Where can I find out more? I’m glad you asked! I’ve popped some suggestions for further reading on each of our badasses below:

• Grace O’Malley: Pirate Queen, The Life of Grace O’Malley by Judith Cook. 

Well this is awkward...they aren’t any more books on the others (unless you can read french, then you my friend are in like re. Jeanne De Clisson!) However, Tomoe, Mariya and Jeanne are all including in the below cracking book (along with tons of other amazing women!)

• Rejected Princesses: Tales of History’s Boldest Heroines, Hellions, and Heretics by Jason Porath 

 

5 reasons Queen Caroline should be your new fave

When it comes to kickass women from history we all have our favourites, but there’s one woman we almost always forget. She’s a super intelligent German immigrant Queen of England, who bought art, culture and medical revolution to her country. She loved dancing, drinking and hanging out with her best mate Isaac Newton.

She is Queen Caroline and here are 5 reasons she should be your next history crush:

Prepare to fall in love!

No1: She bought the enlightenment

A woman happiest when surrounded by piles of books and great minds, Caroline wanted to be a different kind of British Queen. She was determined to channel her love of arts and knowledge to her subjects; ensuring that she left the country in a better state than she found it.

One area that Caroline soon took up was medicine. Smallpox had taken over the cities and with a survival rate of under 40%, Caroline was not playing the lottery with her family’s life.

So she set out to find a way to prevent the disease and came across the idea of inoculation. This was a radical new theory; an import from Constantinople that England’s science community was just starting to examine.

But Caroline wasn’t one to wait around, so she decided she’d look into these new theory herself 

So she extensivley read up on the procedure, carried out a ton of experiments (using prisoners as test subjects; not that morally great!) and interviewed doctors and patients alike.

Eventually she concluded that inoculation was the best route of ensuring her loved ones safety and so she had the entire royal family inoculated….and people were pissed!

What the actual fuck was Caroline doing injecting Royals with literal fucking disease? Was she trying to kill off the royal family?!?

But Caroline remained firm and soon the results of the inoculation were clear; The royal family were both alive and smallpox free! This led to more and more people taking up inoculation (after all, if it was good enough for the Royals…) the death rate dropped and research into expanding inoculations surged

Hooray! Lower rate of infant mortality!!!!

No2. She got the court clean!

Caroline wasn’t just smashing people’s outdated medical views, she was also blowing their minds when it came to personal hygiene!

You see bathing on the regular just wasn’t the done thing. Heating up a tub load of water was really expensive and then lugging it into a bath was a huge ball ache (even with servants!) so people bathed the bare minimum. In 1653 courtier John Evelyn, wrote that he planned to only bathe once a year.

50 years later, things hadn’t changed that much. The courtiers of Caroline’s reign used towels to clean themselves in between their sporadic baths and doused themselves in perfume to cover up any extra stank.

Caroline was not here for this.

See Caroline had read some new fangled medical reviews that said regular bathing was the best way to rid the body of sweat and was essential to health. And just like that, knowledge lover Caroline was fully on board with this whole hygiene thing!

She had regular sponge baths and semi regular baths, taking the unusual step of using washing with actual soap! Not only that but Caroline even insisted on bathing her own children (a move that flummoxed her court)

Caroline’s cleanliness was so fastidious that if you go to her private bathing rooms in Hampton Court, you can still smell her perfume from where it’s seeped until the wooden panels. I repeat, 300 years on, her perfume is still there (it’s like a woody musk rose for this wondering)

 

No.3 She had the best friends

Thanks to both her amazing mind and (probably) the fact she didn’t reek as much as everyone else, Caroline had the coolest set of mates going.

Sorry Taylor, theres a new squad queen in town

From Issac Newton to Robert Walpole and leading philosopher Samuel Clarke, Caroline’s squad was the it club of Georgian society. She hosted salons for her friends, which were essentially a mix of lectures on the latest scientific theories, chats about books, art and philosophy and also a ton of gossiping (because that’s what all the best friends do!)

Caroline served as the mum of the group, holding her salons, bringing new people in and crucially building bridges between the great minds of the day.

She notoriously tried to patched up a decade long argument between Gottfried Leibniz and Isaac Newton over who had created calculus (truly the nerdiest argument in history).

But even though Carolines friends were the bomb…

 

No. 4 Her husband was kind of the worst

(and she dealt with it like a pro!)

Now by no means was George II the worst husband we’ve ever come across (after all his Dad, George l, locked his wife in a tower, and his own son forced his heavily pregnant teenage wife to flee across London in a rickety carriage whilst in labor) but George was by no means a dream boat.

Personality wise of course! Looks wise, he is clearly sex on a stick

He was a cross red faced little man and when he was really angry he’d tear off his wig and kick it across the room. Does that sound hilarious? Yes. But it also sounds like the you’d very quickly have an alternate suggest for where he could stick that wig.

George’s other favourite tantrum trick was violently kicking his feet against the palace walls; which. This is dickish behavior when coming from a 5 year old, but is way worse when you’re 45 and regal interior design costs a shit ton to replace.

aint that the truth

When George became King he started to neglect his witty talented wife, taking on mistresses from her own ladies and giving very little regard to Caroline’s feelings; flaunting them in front of her.

Caroline met this with a fair degree of eye rolling, but the older she got, the harder it became to shrug off her husband showing off newer younger models.

By this time Caroline had to use a wheelchair (this by the way, was a former theatrical ‘sea goddess chariot’ prop that she decided to repurpose). She would roll through court, abandoned by her husband, but far from out.

Instead of wallowing, Caroline found better companionship, through her incredible friends and the countless heroes and heroines that occupied her 3000 strong book collection. 

No5. The way she died

Look I know this sounds morbid, but it’s history and everyone dies!

Since giving birth to her last child, Caroline had suffered from an umbilical hernia (a weakening of the abdominal wall, which causes tissue to bulge out) Because Caroline lived in the 18^th century, this went untreated for years (not good!) until one day when part of her bowel popped out from the hole (really not good!)

Doctors should have pushed the bowel back in, but because this is the 18^th century, they did the most logical thing at the time….they cut off the protruding bit of bowel, destroying Caroline’s digestive system and sentencing her to a drawn out excoriating death.

Damn it terrible painful drawn out deaths, why do you always go for the good ones? 

But Caroline met the pain, the promise of death, all of it, head on. She stayed level headed and remained the most intelligent, witty person in any room. Before all her daily surgeries (yes, daily surgeries!) she would crack countless jokes, telling her surgeon to imagine he was cutting into his ex wife, so he did a better job.

At one point, surgery actually had to be stopped because Caroline could not stop laughing when one of our doctors wigs got to close to a candle and caught fire.

Caroline also maintained her role as court matriarch, ensuring she said goodbye to all of her friends and that her affairs were in order, no string left untied.

George came back to his wife, devastated to see her in such pain. Caroline urged him to re-marry, but he refused, saying he would only have mistress from now on. At this she reacted in true Caroline style; rolling her eyes she said:

‘My God, that doesn’t prevent it’

She died surrounded by family on the 20^th November 1737. As news of her death spread, an outpouring of love surged, with mass mourning as well as art, poetry and music being created in her memory. Her longtime friend composer, Handel, wrote perhaps one of his best works, The ways of Zion do mourn / Funeral Anthem for Queen Caroline, a 40 minute tribute to her incredible life and legacy. 

This was interesting where can I find out more? A great book is Enlightened Princesses: Caroline, Augusta, Charlotte, and the Shaping of the Modern World, it’s pretty pricey though (but I had a copy in my local library, so worth checking out there!)

Another must read that features Caroline as well as the many interesting courtiers that surrounded her, is Lucy Worsley’s,  Courtiers: The Secret History of the Georgian Court, she also did a BBC series on The Georgians, which is well worth watching if you can find it *cough* YouTube *cough *.

4 hacks to smuggle booze prohibition style

Booze! Who doesn’t love it? Trick question – we all do! But what happens when this universal love suddenly becomes illegal? Well, you drink it anyway…just very craftily.

During the prohibition you could be fined thousands and even thrown in jail if you were caught with alcohol, so smuggling booze became serious business.

And its only slightly very illegal!

Now first step for smuggling alcohol – you need to get alcohol to smuggle.

Whilst some breweries got through prohibition by making ‘near beer’ (anywhere from 2 – 0.5% alcohol) those who kept on making the strong stuff had to go deep underground. Operating in woods or under the guise of farms and other out of the way businesses.

It was vital that these suppliers remained unknown and untraceable for police.

This wasn’t an easy task – keeping entire breweries secret required some James Bond level covert operations! Bar sneaking and guns, we all know that James Bond is nothing without wierd gadgets from Q…with that in mind I present:

Cow Shoes

No these are not lift shoes (a ‘la Tom Cruise) they are in fact designed to make the wearers footprints look like cow hooves.

The idea was that any cops looking to try and trace bootleggers to their supplier would lose them when a persons footprints suddenly turned into a cows….which I guess that was a totally normal occurrence in the 1920s and early 30s, as was cattle going for lone forest jaunts…

I don’t know, I’m not a cow historian *shrug*

Cow shoes weren’t the only method to throw off police. Bootleggers also pimped their rides into supped up cars that were easily able outrun the po po. They even went so far as to build a cross country underwater cable car to outfox the fuzz.

Yep, that’s right:

 A cross country underwater cable car… made of torpedoes

Detroit was a bootleggers dream, mainly because it sat right next to Canada, land of maple, manners and legal alcohol!

But how to transport this booze to the US? A boat could was very visible (therefore very catchable) and swimming it over seemed like a whole deal. So naturally an underwater system was built

From Popular Science, March 1932

Torpedoes were filled with liqueur and then attached to a mile-long underwater cable line, running from Canada to Detroit. Thanks to the quick motor running the cable line, a 1932 edition of Popular Science estimates that around 40 torpedoes worth of hooch were transported to America every hour.

That is an impressive amount of definitely tainted illegal booze

As well as torpedo underwater pipelines, bootleggers also had more, erm…homespun ways of smuggling alcohol:

Stuffing booze in random crap

The imagination of bootleggers was apparently endless. Sadly rather than using this imagination for writing the next great American novel, they funneled their skills into putting alcohol into anything they could get there hands on.

Here are just some of the things Alcohol was smuggled in:

• Eggs
• Tinned ‘food’
• Walking canes
• Bibles
• Tailors dummies
• Christmas trees
• Pig carcasses

I fear Babe may not have made it to the city during prohibition

But no matter how ingenious (or mean to pigs) the smuggle, the bootleggers always got caught…welll…unless they were women.

The riot girls of rum running

For some reason police just didn’t seem to suspect women of smuggling booze and even when they were caught, they were let off really lightly (seriously, one woman’s sentence was actually to attend church each Sunday for 2 years…)

Unsurprisingly some women took advantage of this and made serious coin.

Marie Waite (AKA Spanish Marie) was one of these women. Marie single handedly created an entire convey to move tons of alcohol from Havana to Florida’s Key West. Through her active prohibition years she raked in at least $1 million, which in 1920s money, is some Gatsby-esque shit. 

Marie wasn’t alone. Female bootleggers even created a guide to smuggling booze on ones person. From flasks attached to thighs to full on aprons ladden with whisky bottles, their creativity for creating clothes made of cocktails knew no bounds.

The world of female ‘rum running’ was a really diverse one. This open – yet illegal trade -allowed women from all walks of life to make their fortune, as one journalist put it:

‘Some are bold, brainy and beautiful, some hard-boiled and homely, some white, some black, some brown. (But) All are thorns in the sides of Prohibition’

 

This was interesting, where can i find out more? Well, I really need you guys to help me on this one! I’m struggling to find any really amazing books on women in prohibition, in particular, female rum runners…if you know if any, hit me up in the comments or on our Twitter! 

7 Best Hangover Cures In History

Hangovers are as old as history itself. As soon as people worked out how to create and drink alcohol (at least 10,000 years ago, somewhere in the Neolithic period) they were also working out how to cope with the morning after.

From Ancient Egypt and Greece, to the Middle Ages, and even the courts of Kings and Queens, every era has its own hair of the dog, and all of them are infinitely more interesting than the Iron Bru and bacon sandwich that your mate swears by.

1.A Human Skull

Starting strong- our first hangover cure comes from my favourite lover of drunken debauchery, King Charles ll; and it’s a doozy.It isn’t exactly surprising that Charles needed a solid hangover cure (this is the man that drunkenly yelled ‘encouragement’ at the foot of his little brother, James l, bed, whilst the aforementioned was losing his virginity) but the method that Charles used to help abate his headache and woozy stomach was a little, er, un-orthodox.

Respected 17^th Century physician, Dr Jonathan Goddard suggested ‘Goddard Drops’ for the King, which was an elixir consisting of dried viper, ammonia, and the skull of a recently hanged person. Dr Goddard sounds like a delight.

We don’t know how effective Charles found Goddard Drops, I’m going to suggest it probably wasn’t that good- though the ammonia may have helped him to throw up. So if that’s your thing…

2.Eel 

The good people of The Middle Ages were partial to a drink. This was in no small part due to the water being so unclean that it was a much safer option to drink alcohol instead.

Brewing beer had long been popular, but it becomes almost an art form during this period, it’s like craft brewing now, but with less irony. Soldiers returning from the Crusades bought back new knowledge of spices, herbs and mass murder- two of which really helped in creating a new beer boom.

So what did these new beer aficionados’ do to beat the morning after the night before? They ate eels. Now this actually sort of makes sense, eels are jam packed full of good stuff, including protein, calcium, and tons of vitamins!

Unfortunately, that wasn’t why they were eaten. Doctors (a term I loosely use…) of the period believed that once consumed, the eels would become alive when in the stomach, and drink up all the alcohol left inside- a really nice visual image there

3. Soot

‘Mother’s Ruin’(Gin) had started to wain in popularity in Victorian England; as the temperance movement promoted controlled drinking – but you can’t keep a good binge drinker down, and the cocktail soon arrived on British soil which Charles Dickins gleefully wrote about in his American Notes for General Circulation. 

To combat a night of too many Gin-Slings and Timber Doodles (actual Victorian cocktail) people would warm up some milk and then mix in a spoonful of soot; this would be consumed to help with any shakiness and sickness. Though not recommended by me (or anyone) – the charcoal present in soot does actually help to balance acid and alkaline in the stomach, so it might have helped.

It also seems like a much nicer option than another Victorian hangover remedy suggested in The Medical Advisor, which involves pouring vinegar down a person’s throat, and then rubbing it into their temples, which seems less like a hangover remedy and more a really dicky form of water torture.

4. Owls Eggs

The Romans have a reputation for being big drinkers, but for much of the period, that really wasn’t the case. Wine tended to be diluted with water, 1 part wine, 4 parts water, and alcohol was only really consumed during meals. However, feasting could sometimes go on and on, and on and on, and…on; a lot of over indulging on wine and food inevitably leads to a very nasty hangover (think post Christmas…)

Pliny the Elder (above), had just the solution, 2 owls eggs, raw of course. The Great Great Great Grandfather of downing a glass of raw eggs. This would actually help replenish amino acids, so if you can get your hands on owls eggs, then this would actually be pretty useful- good work Pliny!

5. Fried Canary

I spoke to soon. Pliny The Elder wasn’t done. Along with being an esteemed Roman author, naturalist, philosopher and Army commander, Pliny knew that his true calling was developing hangover cures, and that’s how he came up with possibly the greatest idea of his life, defeating a hangover by eating a fried canary.

Pliny was pretty exact on what you needed to do to an unfortunate canary to truly get it’s full benefits and flavour. First one must behead the bird, before fully de-feathering it, then fry it, and add salt to taste before serving.

There aren’t really any benefits to this, its basically a really grim fry up, but it would make a good talking point- should you want to traumatise someone by kidnapping, beheading and then eating their pet. I know what Pliny would do.

6.Coke

Until 1906 Coca Cola contained a pretty hefty dose of cocaine, which made it a very popular hangover cure, because well, that’s going to perk you right up. The cocaine came from coca leaf, which was also prominent in several other products, including Halls Coca Wine, which was was marketed as a ‘great restorative’ (Halls wine is now banned and non-existent, because you know, cocaine…)

Once cocaine became the sort of thing you weren’t allowed to put into your ‘restorative’ products, something else needed to be done to sell them as hangover friendly. Adolphe Jeantet, The Ritz Carlton’s Head Banquet Man (actual job title), had just the thing, and in 1938 his hangover cure took New York City by storm, a chilled bottle of Coca Cola, shaken, and then mixed into a glass of ice cold milk. Delicious? Jeantet’s press agent at the time described the effects of the drink; you drink it ‘take a little nap, and after that you feel wonderful’ –that actually sounds really nice.

7. Crying

Now chances are, depending on the severity of the hangover, you already want to do this, so just let it all out. Kingsley Amis (great name), author of On Drink, suggests that crying is the best hangover cure. Now this particular tip isn’t incredibly historical, On Drink was written in 1972, but I do think it is pretty brilliant.

Kingsley argues that to tackle the physical hangover symptoms, one needs to tackle the emotional symptoms (can you tell this book was written in the 70’s?), he calls this ‘The Metaphysical Hangover’ (yup definitely written in the 1970’s), and the only way to defeat it is by embracing all your feelings, and just having a good cry.

So thats the best that history has to offer your hangover- I hope that it helps, but if not:

I say we listen to Snape